Facing Life’s Record
405
Judah, and they shall not be found.”
Jeremiah 31:34
;
50:20
. “In that
day shall the branch of the Lord be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit
of the earth shall be excellent and comely for them that are escaped
of Israel. And it shall come to pass, that he that is left in Zion, and he
that remaineth in Jerusalem, shall be called holy, even everyone that is
written among the living in Jerusalem.”
Isaiah 4:2, 3
.
The work of the investigative judgment and the blotting out of sins
is to be accomplished before the second advent of the Lord. Since
the dead are to be judged out of the things written in the books, it
is impossible that the sins of men should be blotted out until after
the judgment at which their cases are to be investigated. But the
apostle Peter distinctly states that the sins of believers will be blotted
out “when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of
the Lord; and He shall send Jesus Christ.”
Acts 3:19, 20
. When the
investigative judgment closes, Christ will come, and His reward will
be with Him to give to every man as his work shall be.
In the typical service the high priest, having made the atonement
for Israel, came forth and blessed the congregation. So Christ, at
the close of His work as mediator, will appear, “without sin unto
salvation” (
Hebrews 9:28
), to bless His waiting people with eternal
life. As the priest, in removing the sins from the sanctuary, confessed
them upon the head of the scapegoat, so Christ will place all these
sins upon Satan, the originator and instigator of sin. The scapegoat,
bearing the sins of Israel, was sent away “unto a land not inhabited”
(
Leviticus 16:22
); so Satan, bearing the guilt of all the sins which
he has caused God’s people to commit, will be for a thousand years
confined to the earth, which will then be desolate, without inhabitant,
and he will at last suffer the full penalty of sin in the fires that shall
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destroy all the wicked. Thus the great plan of redemption will reach
its accomplishment in the final eradication of sin and the deliverance
of all who have been willing to renounce evil.
At the time appointed for the judgment—the close of the 2300
days, in 1844—began the work of investigation and blotting out of
sins. All who have ever taken upon themselves the name of Christ
must pass its searching scrutiny. Both the living and the dead are to be
judged “out of those things which were written in the books, according
to their works.”